A heterogeneous network (Heterogeneous Network, HetNet for short) is capable of effectively enhancing throughput of a current network system, and has become a focus of discussion in the 3GPP standard.
FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram of a heterogeneous network in the prior art. As shown in FIG. 1, the HetNet may include a macro base station (Macro eNB) and multiple pico base stations (Pico eNB). The Macro eNB covers a large macrocell (macrocell). In a hot spot area (that is, an area with a high communication demand), multiple Pico eNBs are deployed as required. Each Pico eNB covers a small picocell (picocell). Each picocells are far from another. Therefore, the multiple Pico eNBs may use a same spectrum without the need of considering a problem of interference on each other. From the perspective of the whole macrocell, one spectrum may be reused by multiple Pico eNBs, so that spectrum utilization rate is high and system throughput is high.
However, in the HetNet, the transmit power of the Macro eNB is generally over 10 dB (dB) higher than the transmit power of the Pico eNB. Therefore, for a Pico eNB closer to the Macro eNB, when the Pico eNB uses a same downlink spectrum as the Macro eNB, a terminal corresponding to the Pico eNB, when receiving signals transmitted by the Pico eNB, may suffer strong interference caused by a signal transmitted by the Macro eNB. To overcome the interference, in the prior art, the downlink spectrum used by the Pico eNB is generally controlled, so that the downlink spectrum used by the Pico eNB different from that used by the Macro eNB. Consequently, the Macro eNB and the Pico eNB are capable of using only part of spectrum resources, which thereby leading to low system throughput.